Press Release: McDuffie Proposes OSSE Lot Amendment to the LBA to Prioritize Environmental Justice for Brentwood Residents

News Release — Ward 5 DC Council member Kenyan McDuffie

New project set to further exacerbate air pollution, traffic congestion and parking scarcity for Brentwood residents despite community calls for a construction delay

For Release: Tuesday, August 3, 2021

Contact: Malcom Fox

Washington, DC – Today, the DC Council failed to pass Councilmember McDuffie’s amendment to the Local Budget Act that would have delayed funding of OSSE’s new bus lot at 1601 W Street. Councilmember McDuffie introduced this amendment to amplify Brentwood residents’ concerns about the additional air pollution, traffic congestion and parking challenges this new lot would produce. Sadly, this vote continues a longtime trend of environmental injustice against Ward 5 residents where the majority of the District’s industrial sites are located.

“I am deeply frustrated that executive agencies prioritized expedience over environmental justice for Brentwood residents who already endure environmental consequences from industrial land uses concentrated in their neighborhood,” said Councilmember McDuffie. “I fully support union workers who deserve better working conditions; however their needs shouldn’t be pitted against the community’s health and well-being. I stood with Ivy City residents to prevent government officials from parking buses on the Crummell School lot, and I stand with Brentwood residents against this current effort to do the same.”

Ward 5 houses roughly 50% of the District’s industrial land use sites and communities of color disproportionately suffer the health consequences caused by this pollution. Councilmember McDuffie has long championed environmental justice in Ward 5. He secured funding to close the W Street Trash Transfer Station through eminent domain in 2014, created the Industrial Land Transformation Task force to modernize industrial land use in Ward 5 and secured $250,000 in the FY22 budget to fund on-demand air quality testing for Ward 5 residents. The OSSE lot project should be paused until the promised revised traffic study and PDR Land Use Study, funded in the FY22 budget, are completed to ensure that the burdens associated with industrial and municipal uses are equitably distributed across the District.

“We commend Councilmember McDuffie for using his platform to elevate the concerns of the Brentwood community,” said Parisa Norouzi, Executive Director of Empower DC. “The city’s failure to plan for the equitable placement of polluting facilities comes at the cost of human lives in communities like Brentwood, where industrial uses have been overconcentrated. Racial equity requires us to re-evaluate and reinvent the ways we engage with impacted Black and brown communities. Councilmember McDuffie is right in calling attention to the inequity inherent in this project.”

Since the project started in 2019, Councilmember McDuffie, advocates and residents have raised three primary concerns that executive agencies have failed to meaningfully address; that the OSSE lot would further degrade air quality, significantly increase traffic congestion and make the limited residential parking even more scarce. The Traffic Impact Study from DGS included errors that failed to properly measure the effect this new lot would have on local traffic and parking concerns. Additionally, the Air Quality Analysis underestimated the impact this additional facility would have on Brentwood as they are already inundated with polluting uses.

Councilmember McDuffie is committed to fighting for environmental justice in Ward 5 and across the District. He is currently in talks with community members and advocates to form an environmental justice working group that will recommend more equitable environmental policies and help mobilize communities against environmental injustices.

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